Histoire des Martyrs du Iapon depuis l’an MDCXII iusques a MDCXX.

Composée en Latin par le R.P. Nicolas Trigaut, de la Compagnie de Jesus. Et traduite en francois par le P. Pierre Morin, de la mesme Compagnie. A Paris, chez Sebastien Cramoisy, ruë sainct Jacques aux Cicognes, 1624. Quarto (240 x 180 mm), contemporary limp vellum (stained), spine with old lettering in manuscript; illustrated title-leaf engraved by Michel van Lochom, with depiction of the martyrs being watched over by angels, 19th-century stamp of the Société des Prêtres de Saint-Irénée (Lyon, founded in 1833) to bottom margin; pp. [20], 638, [2 blank], [26], [1], [1 blank]; illustrated with 2 engraved plates and 3 full-page engravings by I. Picart in the text (serving as frontispieces to each of the five Livres) depicting tortures and executions of Christians in Japan; woodcut initials and headpieces; light browning and scattered spotting, pale water-staining to top corners of preliminary leaves including the title and Plate I, marginal water stain to Plate II, and to half-a-dozen leaves in the final section; otherwise a very good copy, from the library of Mexican bibliophile Florencio Gavito, viscount of Alborada and Villarubio (1882-1960), his ex libris to the front pastedown.

First French translation, made by the Jesuit Father Pierre Morin, of the De Christianis apud Iaponios Triumphis (1623) of fellow Jesuit Nicolas Trigault (1577-1628), one of the most prominent of the early Catholic missionaries in China. It is an account of the persecutions of missionaries and Japanese Kirishitan in the early years of the Tokugawa Shogunate, based on missionary letters. Father Morin augments his translation with his own Supplement des cinq livres du R. Pere Nicolas Trigaut (pp. 613-631), as well as a Catalogue des martyrs iaponnais qui ont endure pour Jesus-Christ depuis l’an 1612 iusques a 1620 (pp. 632-636), and a Catalogue des maisons et residences de la Compagnie de Jesus ont esté contraints de quitter durant cette persecution (pp. 637-638). The book’s publisher, Sébastien Cramoisy, is associated with numerous Jesuit printings.

Cordier, BJ, 295